


The Solace of You

by UninspiredPoet



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/F, Gay Scientific Activities, Rating Will Change Appropriately, Search for a Cure, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-25
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:35:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23317708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UninspiredPoet/pseuds/UninspiredPoet
Summary: Amélie is now the sole proprietor of the investment firm formerly run by her late husband. She now uses her maiden name Guillard for business reasons, as there is still dust settling over the sullied name of Lacroix following his death.It’s also much easier for a former ballet dancer to be taken seriously in the context of business when her name doesn’t ring any bells.Angela is a research doctor desperate to continue her potentially life-saving work whose time and funding at her University have both run out.Amélie has come to offer her a solution. A partnership. And it's an offer Angela can't afford to refuse.
Relationships: Widowmaker | Amélie Lacroix/Angela "Mercy" Ziegler
Comments: 75
Kudos: 166





	1. The Catch

**Author's Note:**

> Just a silly little AU that I can't get off my mind. Sorry to all the friends who have had to listen to me yell about this.  
> Enjoy the read, if you're reading. 
> 
> Ratings will update appropriately.

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/49698667006/in/dateposted-public/)

Amélie’s eyes flicked over the plastic-bound volume she’d been looking over for the better part of the morning. Sharp and focused and cold as she took in all the words that, just a few short years ago, wouldn’t have made any sense to her at all. 

But if Amélie had become adept at anything since everything that had happened to her, it was reading medical jargon and familiarizing herself with the rather dry reading that was scientific research.

And this particular research was quite interesting, indeed. As was the doctor that had published it. Ziegler. A pioneer in her field. The inventor of her field. 

Nanobiology hadn’t seemed like a viable option for Amélie until there were no more options left, and the more lectures she watched - the more of Dr. Ziegler’s papers she managed to get her hands on, the more her thoughts began to linger on the promise of it all. 

Her eyes flashed up to the computer screen in front of her as sound began to filter through the speakers. 

_“Good evening and welcome, all in attendance. It is so good to see every seat filled this evening. The President of the Biomedical Engineering program of Emory University thanks you for your time, and for your support._

_As you all know, we’ve all gathered here today for whom I consider to be one of the most exciting lecturers this program has ever welcomed to our stage. Please, extend your warmth, your curiosity, and your kindness to Dr. Angela Zielger.”_

“Aloysius…” Amélie didn’t even look at the well-dressed Omnic man who had recently placed a glass of wine next to her keyboard and faded into the shadows of the room. He’d come to learn Amélie’s moods by now. He’d come to learn all the ways she’d changed, and all the ways she hadn’t. And he could tell she was deep in thought. Far too deep to require anything of him. Until she said his name, at least. 

“Madame?” 

“When can I have a meeting scheduled with this Angela Ziegler?” 

“You intend to go, yourself, Madame Lacroix?” As he asked the question, his head tilted in a further display of curiosity. Perhaps concern. The quiet noise of the machinery that made up the tendons in his neck was almost a comfort to Amélie, now. The subtle sounds of his movement were often the only sounds aside from her own that she heard. 

“I do.” She responded simply. “Book my tickets under Guillard.” 

“Naturally.” 

He was quiet for some time before he finally continued speaking. “Would you prefer I addressed you in the same manner?” 

“No.” Amélie’s response had been a little too quick. A little too defensive. Even she had heard that in her tone when the words had come from her. 

Aloysius lowered his head, and if Amélie had the attention to spare him right now - she might have recognized this as a sort of sad resignation. 

But all her attention was focused on the woman commanding the lecture hall on the screen in front of her. For now, at least. 

Later that evening, she would be leaning over one of the various balconies she favored around the château with a glass of wine in her hand as her eyes scoured the dark water beyond as if there were any answers there. As if there ever had been or ever would be. 

It was Fall. Once upon a time, she might have thought it lovely outside, between the leaves turning the night air into flickers of gold in the darkness and the soothing chill in the air. 

“Madame?” 

For some reason, Aloysius’ voice didn’t register right away over the gentle lapping of the inky water against the stone below. Nor did the sound of his movement as he made his way out onto the balcony. 

“Amélie? Your shawl.”

Amélie drew in a breath at the sound of her own name and looked over her shoulder to find Aloysius standing beside her holding a mink stole. One of many. The way he’d said her name drew to mind far-away memories of a time when she was much younger and...happy. 

“Thank you, Aloysius.” That was all she could think to say. 

And it made him happy enough, judging by the low humming sound that came from him as he carefully put the shawl around Amélie’s shoulders. He had always been so protective of her. Even as a child, he’d been there when her parents couldn’t be. Making sure the fireplaces were lit - because she’d liked that, then. Bringing her favorite snacks to her…fetching books for her from the upper library shelves...

Everything seemed so painfully distant, now, that it was hard to be confronted with it. Harder this evening than usual, even. Best to change the subject.

“Brush up on my English with me, Aloysius.” The words came freely in her second language. Her accent was heavy, but it always had been. 

“Of course. What do you wish to talk about?” 

Aloysius had none at all. 

“Do you think this will work?” Amélie stood from where she’d been leaning over the stone rail of the balcony and lifted herself onto it to sit, much to Aloysius’ visible dismay. He didn’t try to stop her, however. Had she still been a child, he might have gently snatched her off and placed her back on her feet.

But this was an adjustment for him, too. He had spent years keeping the château in repair for Amélie and her husband’s infrequent visits. He’d done so because this was his home. It always had been. Never would he have expected to care for Amélie, again. 

He wished every day the circumstances were better. He mourned just as often for the smiling, carefree girl he had helped to raise - and for the woman she had become before all this. 

But he treated her no differently. Just as Amélie had never treated him as anything less. 

“I hope for such an outcome with my every thought.” He responded simply. 

“That isn’t a true answer, Aloysius.” Amélie’s voice was quiet suddenly, and a furrow had formed between her sharply arched brows. 

“The Doctor is brilliant.” He continued evenly. “I have seen all that you’ve seen and read all that you’ve read. I have reason to believe there is hope.” 

Amélie nodded faintly and pulled the shawl more tightly around herself more out of habit than anything. 

“Will you be requiring anything else this evening, Madame?” Aloysius asked after it was clear their conversation was over. 

“No, Aloysius. Thank you.” 

He made a little sound then. One Amélie still didn’t quite understand. He’d never made it before her return to the château, and she didn’t really have the energy to begin deciphering it now. 

She didn’t have to, though. He had already retreated back into the endless rooms and corridors he’d come from - no doubt to continue his solitary, seemingly endless job of painting the grand room a color that Amélie had very much loved once upon a time. 

She let him, of course. As changed as she was, she didn’t have the heart to tell him to stop. If it gave him some comfort to fight against the seemingly endless decay her life had become, she would allow it.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------

Angela sat stoically at her desk where she’d been for the better part of an hour. She’d missed another impossible publication deadline. Not that it mattered anymore, what with her staff being cut from a dozen to two and her funding being halved the prior week.

The directors’ meeting she was still trying to recover from was still sharp in her mind. Each dissenting voice coming in answer to her own protest was still pounding away at her eardrums. 

She’d almost canceled the meeting she had scheduled for the evening, and she likely would have - if she could’ve afforded to. But this was a possible investor. And those were in very short supply these days. 

Still, she’d never been a fan of private work and the roads it could lead her down - and her skepticism and anxiety were only compounding as the seconds ticked by. 

“Angela?” 

The doctor looked up at her assistant and managed to offer her a rather tired smile as her only response. 

“Ms. Guillard is here for you. She’s...I’m not sure the coffee we have around will be her favorite.” 

Angela was inclined to agree, and she hadn’t even met the woman yet. But cuts had been necessary, and Folgers had been a mainstay for months now. 

Angela had always hated Folgers. 

“We’ll have to try it, anyway. I don’t have anything better to offer right now.” Angela’s voice was calm despite her inner conflicts, and the assistant nodded and carried the cups she’d been holding over to Angela’s desk. 

“You cleaned up.” The younger woman remarked as she looked around the cramped quarters where papers had been stowed and shoved out of sight, likely in a hurry. 

“I tried,” Angela remarked dryly. 

The assistant made herself scarce as the sound of heels clicking down the corridor outside caught both their attention, and Angela drew herself up to her full height as she stood just in time for her guest’s appearance in the doorway. 

The sight was...unexpected, to say the least. From the finely tailored pants and designer heels to the corset around her waist and the jacket to cover it. Even the fur collar. It was all ostentatious and out of place and ridiculous and altogether breathtaking, even for someone as jaded as Angela. 

It even took her a beat or two to realize this woman was wearing sunglasses inside. Sunglasses that were removed by a gloved hand to reveal perhaps the strangest eyes Angela had ever seen. Her thoughts raced, then, as the entire picture came into view. The blue skin. The etherealness in the yellow of those eyes. She was speechless. 

Thankfully, Amélie was quite used to such reactions. 

“Dr. Ziegler, I presume?”

“Yes.” Angela responded quickly, snapping herself back into reality and moving around her desk. “Your coat?” 

“My coat is fine, thank you.” Amélie nearly rolled her eyes at herself. Polite. Be polite. “I prefer to keep it on, you see.” 

“Of course,” Angela responded with a lift of her brows, gesturing towards the chair in front of her desk. “Coffee for you. I’m afraid it isn’t very good. Please. Have a seat.” 

Amélie made a sound in the back of her throat and did exactly that, reaching for the cup and lifting it to her lips. She tried not to make an expression of distaste as she put it back down on the edge of the Doctor’s desk. She was, at least, fairly certain she’d succeeded. 

“So.” Angela glanced down at a printed email on her desk. “You wanted to discuss my research.” 

“Correct,” Amélie responded simply as she crossed her legs rather elegantly and folded her hands in her lap. “And I’m sure you’re aware I represent the Lacroix investment firm, and that my interest goes beyond the intellectual.” 

“Financial, then.” Angela queried as she leaned back in her chair and bit her lower lip for a moment in thought. 

“Yes.” Another simple answer. Too simple. “I...have been made aware of both the importance of your research and of your University’s disinterest in the continued funding of your program.” 

A bitter pill for Angela, right now. A pull that was far too fresh. 

That much, Amélie could tell by the way the other woman’s face fell. 

“I haven’t come to cause you any further...ah, grief or disappointment. I’ve come to offer you a solution. A partnership.” 

Angela could have sworn her heart skipped a beat despite her apprehension. The way she figured it, she had maybe six months left here. And six months just wasn’t enough time. She was bordering on desperate...if she wasn’t already there. 

“What kind of solution? What kind of partnership?” Angela asked wearily despite how attractive this vague offer had begun to sound. 

“You looked at me quite carefully when I arrived. You find me interesting? Or perhaps my condition?” Amélie didn’t have a problem looking Angela in the eyes. Angela didn’t have a problem looking right back. 

“Well, yes. I do find your condition interesting. What does that have to do with your firm’s offer?” 

“Everything.” Amélie shrugged - but the gesture was so subtle Angela wondered if she’d imagined it. 

“I believe your research might coincide with my current state of being. Or, at the very least, the argument could be made that I might be an interesting subject.” 

“Are you being purposely obtuse?” Angela asked as she leaned forward to rest her arms against the edge of her desk. This woman was...already impossible and she’d known her for all of five minutes. “Are you offering to be my partner, or asking to be my patient?” 

Amélie almost smiled. It was present in the faint quirk at the corners of her lips before it was gone. A ghost of an expression just before she slid her bag from her shoulder and produced a bound set of documents from it which she placed in front of Angela. 

“Both.” She said as she gestured towards the papers. A contract. This was a contract. “You would continue your research as you have been. You would have unlimited funding. And you would attempt to apply what research is relevant to me, well...to me.” 

Angela was flipping rapidly through the pages. None of this lingo was new to her. It was well-written. Air-tight. Logical. Yet…

“Human experimentation, Ms. Guillard?” She asked as she slowly closed the contract. “You would have me violate every oath I’ve made in order to continue my research?” 

“Not at all,” Amélie said rather dismissively. “I think the entire world would benefit from the things we could accomplish together. And if you find your field of study would be of no help to me, your contract will remain in place until you have completed what you set out to do, here. At a university that values your publication volume over your value as a doctor and as the pioneer of your field.” 

Angela was visibly taken aback. What was the catch, then? 

“Catch?”

Scheisse. Had she really asked that out loud? 

“Please excuse my scepticism. It isn’t often the solution to all of one’s problems walks into their life in designer heels.” 

Another ghost of an expression from Amélie. Amusement, this time. Angela was almost sure of it. 

“There is nothing to excuse, Dr. Zielger. The catch is that you would spend a great majority of your time for the duration of your work at my château.” 

“Your château?” Angela asked with a tilt of her head. “Where, exactly, might that be?” 

“Near Annecy in the south of France. As mentioned, you would have everything you need. There is a small village nearby, and we are able to take deliveries on a weekly basis.” 

“There is nothing in the contract you handed me about my requirements of my research facilities.” Angela countered quickly. She was grasping at straws. Amélie could see it written plainly on her face. 

“It would only be right for you to oversee the building of it, don’t you think, chérie? You would, of course, have complete control over everything. Site choice, equipment and the like. Trust me, there is plenty of space where you would be going. ...May I ask you a question, Dr. Ziegler?” 

Dr. Ziegler, who was wavering. _Dangerously_. 

Amélie’s otherworldly eyes regarded Angela in a way that she wasn’t entirely sure she was comfortable with. She felt, suddenly, like she was on a glass slide beneath one of her own microscopes. 

“Ask away.” 

“What do you have to lose?” 

That question had felt like a punch delivered directly to her gut, and Angela leaned back in her chair slowly as a result. Her rather stony expression softened as she looked down at the contract on her desk and then slowly turned her attention away from the situation in its entirety to look through her office window into her darkened lab. 

A lab that would soon be filled with someone else’s equipment. Someone else’s ideas and sweat and tears despite all of her own already permeating all of it.

She made a vague gesture towards it, but Amélie’s eyes didn’t follow. No, her burning gaze remained laser-focused on Angela. 

“Nothing.” Angela finally said quietly. Oh, that had stung. 

Terribly.

The next moves were Amélie’s, and they were silent. They consisted of the placing of a pre-stamped and addressed envelope that was clearly meant to fit the contract and a single plane ticket. A plane ticket dated for next week. 

“Wait.” Angela stammered as Amélie stood and began to make her way towards the door. She stopped just short of it, her sunglasses lifted halfway to her face and looked at Angela over her shoulder. 

“I don’t even know your name, Ms. Guillard.” 

“Amélie. Thank you for your time, Dr. Ziegler. We can discuss any further questions via email, should you have any. 

“Angela.” 

Amélie lowered her glasses and turned just enough that she could see the other woman a bit better. “Hm?” 

“It would be quite strange for partners to address each other by surname alone if that is what we end up becoming.” Angela continued as she stood and straightened her lab coat. “My name is Angela.” 

“Very well, Angela. I trust you’ll let me know the moment you make your decision.” 

“Of course.”

And then the glasses were back on, and Amélie had slipped away in the direction she’d come from while she shouldered her bag and lifted her collar against her neck. 

Angela slumped down in her seat with her head in her hands as she came to the stomach-sinking realization that she’d already made her decision. 

Even if it felt like it had been made for her. 

Besides, a château in France? All the funding she could ever need? 

How bad could it really be?


	2. Confidentiality

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/49698667006/in/dateposted-public/)

Angela frowned softly as she looked around the airport. She'd been told she'd be picked up the moment she arrived, yet she didn't see Amélie anywhere. Sure, the flight had been wonderful. First-class usually was, but...she was exhausted. She wanted a bed. The rest could wait.

She realized when she saw a rather large Omnic waving across from her gate that perhaps she shouldn't have been looking so hard for a human escort. He was even holding a sign. A sign that read ‘Dr. Ziegler’, despite Amélie telling him repeatedly that that was rather old-fashioned and lacking in class. 

Yet, there was something about him that made Angela smile as she approached him with one bag on each shoulder and a rolling case behind her. The rest had been shipped ahead of her arrival, and she'd been assured by Amélie herself that it had all arrived safely and accounted for. 

“Hello. You must be the person I'm looking for.” She greeted with as much politeness as she could muster after such a long flight. She glanced down at his sign with a smile, and he made a little sound that Angela didn't quite recognize in response. She wondered, for a moment, if he had the ability to speak - before he sated her curiosity for her.

“I believe I am. As long as you are Dr. Ziegler?” Despite the lack of outward human expression, Angela couldn't help but notice the fact that his tone sounded like it had a smile in it somewhere. 

“I am. And you are?”

He was too busy relieving her of every bag she was carrying to answer her right away. But he got around to it.

“Aloysius. I'm the caretaker of Château Guillard, among other things.” 

“Things like your mysterious Madame Guillard, I'm assuming?” She asked as she began walking at his side once he pointed them in the right direction.

“You could say that, I suppose. She needs little care.” 

White lies never hurt, right? No, he supposed they didn’t. 

Angela had little else to say until they were approaching a waiting car. Until Aloysius was placing her luggage in the trunk and then opening one of the back doors for her. 

“I would rather ride in the front, if at all possible.” She responded to his reaching for the door handle. 

He made another one of those sounds she was going to have to start figuring out, before moving to open the front passenger seat for her instead. 

Soon enough, they were driving away from the airport and Angela was taking in the view from her window passively. 

“How long is the drive?” She asked absently. 

“An hour, and then a short boat trip from the village.” He responded simply.

Angela’s head turned and one of her brows arched. “Boat trip? So it has a moat?” 

He laughed. A melodic sound the bordered on sounding like a series of chimes that Angela found altogether pleasant. 

“It’s an island.” He finally responded. “I believe moats refer more to castles, yes?” 

“So you’re telling me that’s not what this is?” Angela asked in amusement as the corners of her lips twitched up slightly. 

“It’s a château.” 

“Château Guillard, yes. Which, if my general knowledge and research hasn’t failed me, makes Amélie nobility of some kind. She shares the name of the property, so she isn’t simply a purchaser.” 

“It’s all rather old-fashioned, now. Titles and things of that nature. Don’t you think?” Aloysius asked without looking over. He seemed solely focused on the road in front of him, despite the fact that this car was clearly capable of driving itself. 

“A very diplomatic answer,” Angela looked out the window again, then. “I suppose you’d prefer a quiet ride.” 

“Not necessarily. I would just prefer that she answer any questions about herself that you might have.”

“Fair enough.” Angela mused with a faint smile. 

As it turned out, it was a rather quiet ride despite Aloysius’s reassurance. 

Angela fell asleep shortly thereafter with her forehead against the window. 

The boat ride that followed was a bit of a blur, really. Between the flight and her impromptu nap, there was nothing particularly ‘grounding’ about approaching the château from the storybook village across the way. Nor was there anything reassuring about the cold greyness that had settled over everything as she took in the nearly overwhelming stateliness of the structure they were walking towards. The stonework and the archways and the terraces and the moss and vines that had found their places amongst all of it. 

“First impressions?” Aloysius asked as they finally began ascending a large set of stone stairs that led to an even larger entryway of a rather incredibly wooden door that was easily two stories tall or better, dark-stained and adorned with dark iron filigree.

“It’s...stately,” Angela responded as her eyes slowly lifted to take it all in. “It’s rather stunning, really.”

Another sound came from Aloysius, then, and it finally dawned on Angela that this sound likely meant he was pleased. The realization had her turning a faint smile in his direction. 

“Thank you.” He responded as he pushed the door open and began bustling inside with Angela’s bags in tow. “I’ve done my best.”

For some reason, it hadn’t occurred to Angela that a single person could possibly manage all this alone. Probably because the prospect wasn’t at all logical.

And when they stepped inside and she was met with the smell of stasis mingling with relatively fresh paint, she realized that - no - it wasn’t logical. But that he had, in fact, done his best. Some pieces were covered for safe-keeping. Some were recently tended to. It seemed there were some things he could get around to, but that ‘some things’ certainly didn’t entail all things. 

Angela had never felt such a strange mixture of emotions upon entering a home, if that’s what one could call this. It was almost sad, in a way. All the darkness and the once-upon-a-time beauty of it all. It reminded her of-

“Hello, Angela.” 

Angela’s attention darted to an upper level along the side of the grand entryway and she was treated to the sight of Amélie leaning over a railing peering down at her. She couldn't formulate a response quickly enough. 

“Forgive me. We did establish that we were going to be on a first-name basis, yes?” Amélie queried with an unreadable expression that Angela could only just see from where she was. 

“We did, yes,” Angela responded as her attention stayed riveted to the woman above her. “You have an impressive home, Amélie.”

“Mm…” Amélie gestured vaguely and shrugged. “Aloysius will show you to your room. I’m sure you wouldn’t mind having dinner in your room tonight. That’s where it will be served. You need your sleep. Your set-up will begin tomorrow after you’ve been given the tour and selected your location.” 

“Thank you,” Angela called up as she squinted in an attempt to better see the other woman. She looked to be dressed down considerably compared to their first meeting. At least from what Angela could see at this distance. “If you are free, however, it would be nice if you stop by said room at some point. I feel we have a lot to discuss.”

Amélie tilted her head in a faint nod before she was gone again. Melding into the darkness of the upper floor where she’d no doubt come from in the first place.

Angela found her room to be more, somehow, than she'd been expecting. All her things that had been shipped ahead were stacked neatly on one side. There were fresh coverings on the bed, and the heavy curtains had been drawn back to make it more welcoming, perhaps. 

But it was already fairly welcoming. Between the warm, ornately-carved antique furniture that was, no doubt, utterly priceless to the large hearth that was situated on the far side of the room across from the bed. There was a wardrobe. One more than large enough to fit what clothing she'd brought and Angela poked her head into what looked to be a relatively recently renovated en-suite bathroom decked out in marble and plush floor coverings as Aloysius placed the rest of her luggage on the floor for her to unpack at her leisure.

He was watching her, though she didn't realize it. She was too busy staring out the window of the bedroom at a view that stole her breath from her. The beauty of the dark water of the lake and the Golden leaves of the trees on the hillsides beyond was without equal. Like a painting come to life before her eyes. 

“This room is lovely, Aloysius.” Angela finally said quietly as she turned to face him, only to find him already moving towards the doorway.

He didn't stop to answer her, but she caught his response nonetheless.

“Madame Guillard chose it for you.” 

Angela had only managed to unpack her most essential items when the smell of approaching food reminded her of how hungry she was by way of a sharp pang in her stomach. 

She looked up from the box she was scrounging through and was more than a little surprised to see Amélie herself holding what looked to be a charcuterie board in one hand and two glasses in the other, along with a bottle of wine tucked in a towel beneath her arm. Amélie, wearing a flowing black shirt that clung in places that suggested it had been as deliberately tailored as her tight, dark pants. It was such a plain outfit compared to the first one Angela had seen. But it was no less impactful in its simplicity. 

She held it all so gracefully. Like the perfect balance of it all wasn’t the least bit difficult to manage. And she lifted a dark, delicately arched brow in response to Angela’s surprise.

“You said you wanted me to stop by.” Amélie offered in a cool, even tone before making her way across the room to a little nook in one corner that contained a small table and two chairs. Perfectly convenient. Almost intentional. Whether or not that was the case, Angela had no idea.

“Of course. I didn't expect you to hand-deliver my dinner. It seems...rather beneath you if our first meeting was anything to go by.”

Amélie scoffed quietly as she placed the board down along with the wine bottle and glasses she'd been holding, watching Angela cross the room to join her in the chair opposite her own. 

“What is the saying?” Amélie responded as she uncorked the pre-opened wine and sat the bottle back down to allow it to breathe for a moment. “Something about two birds, yes? In any event, it isn't only your dinner. I had hoped to share it with you while we spoke. Though, I hope you already had a line of conversation in mind when you requested my presence. I'm afraid I'm not entirely used to having company over dinner.” 

“I did, yes. Though, I'm not sure it's entirely appropriate to discuss medical history over fine wine and equally fine cheese.” Angela sounded faintly amused as she reached for the bottle, not out of impatience, but because it seemed like the thing to do. Amélie seemed like the type of woman you poured wine for.

Amélie watched her with a flicker of a smile before responding. “I assure you, it doesn't bother me. And I know it won't bother you. It's best we skip all the pleasantries, I think. There aren't many, really. So why bother?”

Angela looked from Amélie to the bottle and back again. She didn't recognize the label. Only that the vintage suggested it was likely a rather exclusive bottle. Little did she know it wasn't. At least, not here. Not to the Guillard family. Or, more accurately, Amélie. 

“You're right, of course.” Angela sighed as she sliced off a rather inviting piece of soft, light cheese and scraped it gingerly onto one of the grainy, light crackers present on the board. “I'd like to know more about your condition. It's origins. The symptoms of it.” 

“A loaded question.” Amélie took a sip of her wine, largely ignoring the food for now. “I'll have all my medical files to you in the morning for review. Every blood test, every psychological exam, everything that's been done to me since the start of all this. They'll tell you more than I can. As far as the origins, I do not know them. This is something that was done to me. I remember nothing more. I'm told I was missing for a time, and when I was found - I was found like this.”

Angela glanced at the rather delicate, meaningless gesture Amélie made with one of her hands. She was drawn once again to the coloration of the other woman's skin. It didn't look to have much to do with pigment. Angela had treated too many close-to-freezing patients in Switzerland to think that. 

To date her own curiosity, she reached out and lifted a questioning gaze in Amélie’s direction. After a moment of hesitation, Amélie bridged the distance between their hands and let her own rest against the table.

Amélie hated the feeling of living warmth against her skin. She hated the reminder. And that didn't change now, as Angela’s fingertips slid around her wrist and eventually felt lightly at her pulse point.

The beating was slow, yet strangely even. A perfectly healthy heart, perhaps. Yet…it was as if that heart was stuck in some sort of warp of time. Slow. Sluggish. Not struggling, no.

Angela had never felt anything like it, and she pulled her hand away slowly. 

The look of discomfort on Amélie’s face wasn't lost on her. But Amélie wasn't the first patient she'd had that didn't favor human touch, and she likely wouldn't be the last. Best to not broach the subject, now. She would have many of those answers in the morning when she delved into medical records she was already itching to get her hands on.

Because she felt it again. The desperate need to help. To fix. It compounded tenfold as she watched Amélie’s unnaturally vivid amber eyes regard the tray for a moment. Avoiding. Searching for something to look at that wasn't Angela. 

“I should remind you, Amélie, that as my patient, there is nothing that you could say or do that would betray the confidentiality our relationship requires. And there are things you could tell me that a stack of files could never.” 

“Another time, then. You should rest, Doctor.” Amélie said quietly as she touched along the delicate stem of her wine glass with her fingertips. “I'm sure you are exhausted.” 

“Angela.” The correction was full of understanding. It wasn't reproachful or harsh in any way. Just a gentle reminder. “And I am. But I look forward to receiving those files in the morning. I look forward to working with you.” 

Amélie nodded faintly as she stood, wine glass in hand. “And I, with you.”

Angela stood just after Amélie. Again, it seemed like the thing to do. Amélie just had that presence about her. The devastating kind that demanded attention. That demanded reverence.

At least here. Here, outside of a lab or a doctor's office. This wasn't Angela’s domain. No, it was entirely suited to Amélie and her current state of being. 

In a way that seemed, again, intentional.

Angela was beginning to wonder if there was anything about this woman that _wasn't_ intentional, as she turned and headed for the door. Angela could barely hear the click of her heels against the stone floors as she retreated. 

She could remember hearing them distinctly the first time they'd met. 

Another choice, perhaps.

Another carefully calculated decision to create an illusion of control, perhaps - Angela surmised. 

It was an easy assumption to make. Generally, when one lost their agency in one area - the natural next course was to try and gain more somewhere else, if what was lost couldn't be recovered.

Perhaps that ‘area’ for Amélie had become those around her. 

Angela imagined she was going to find a lot of things in those files in the morning that said as much, if not more. But she had never been as rigid as most of her colleagues. She had never been as closed-minded and reliant on the words on paper of others to come to her own conclusions. 

A diagnosis was a fine thing, yes.

But it wasn't an answer. Not really. Because an answer should be a solution. Not a sentence. Not a brand to be worn and dwelled upon. 

A diagnosis, in most cases, was merely a step in the right direction. And Angela was beginning to understand this was going to be a very long series of steps, indeed. 

She wasn’t intimidated, though. Not by any of it. Not by the imposing manor she’d taken up residence in for the foreseeable future, nor its equally imposing Madame Guillard. It was a challenge. A puzzle. 

And Angela was determined. 

She was also determined to sleep soundly tonight. And the still nearly-full bottle of wine Amélie had left for her saw to that rather nicely.


	3. Misgivings

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/49698667006/in/dateposted-public/)

Angela drew in a slow, deep breath as she looked around the former wine cellar that had been turned into what had to be one of the most well-equipped labs she’d ever run.

That thought had been weighing heavily on her. Angela had always tried to do the right thing. Almost every decision she’d made in her professional career had been with an end goal of helping people, yet time after time her funding had been cut.

The people with money just...weren’t interested in helping people. Yet, here she was. In a literal castle working for a woman who wasn’t just your run of the mill rich person. 

But was it all bad?

That was a question Angela kept asking herself as she continued notating each piece of equipment on the holo screen she was carrying around in one hand. Not that there wasn't already a shipping manifest. Not that she hadn't overseen the conversion of this cellar into a very functional, very workable lab over the past week or so.

To the point of exhaustion, actually. She'd gotten only the bare minimum of sleep since the equipment had started arriving, and if it hadn't been for Aloysius sharing the burden of the workload with her and the small team hired to get her set up - she'd likely have turned into a puddle of exhaustion and desperation by now. For sleep, mostly. But also for a meal that consisted of more than strong coffee and whatever she could hold in one hand while she typed or wrote with the other. 

It was all catching up to her now. Maybe that's what had her slipping into the more primal recesses of her mind. Those that operated on emotion instead of reason. With a sigh, she placed her holo screen down on the nearest flat surface and leaned over it with her face resting against her arms. 

She'd been nursing a headache since yesterday. Perhaps if she just shut her eyes for a moment...

“Angela?”

Angela drew in a quick, sharp breath at the unfamiliar, accented voice that had murmured her name. She very nearly jerked away from the hand on her shoulder, too, if she hadn't managed to focus her vision on the mildly concerned expression on Amélie’s face. 

“I must have dozed off.” Angela said dismissively, her voice slightly hoarse as she slowly righted herself.

“On your feet, no less…” Amélie responded with a lift of one of her dark, delicate brows. “Dinner is served in the dining hall. Aloysius told me you haven't had a proper meal since the first crate arrived.”

“I'm fine.” Angela said, knowing she absolutely wasn't. 

“I see. It's only that I hoped you might join me.” Amélie said in a low, even tone that drew Angela’s full attention to her. To the unreadable mask that expression had slipped back into now that Angela was more aware. 

Amélie’s reasoning wasn't exactly selfless. She needed Angela to be healthy. They were to start their trials in a few short days, after all, and despite the fact that she had stayed entirely out of Angela’s way since she'd begun her work, Aloysius had kept her well informed of the doctor’s comings and goings. And even in Amélie’s opinion, they consisted of far too much work and far too little else. 

“If you're asking me to have dinner with you, I will.” Angela finally said as she slowly slipped out of the white coat she was wearing and adjusted her glasses where they'd gotten a little skewed from her impromptu nap. It had been a couple of days since she'd even attempted to mess with her contacts. 

Amélie was only just seeing them for the first time. They made Angela look almost like someone else entirely. Much more the Doctor and much less...well. Whatever else she was. Amélie didn't know. 

“I am.” Amélie said simply, and for the first time - Angela took real notice of her, as well. She glanced at the casual state of her dress. The simple silk blouse and the high-waisted black pants it was tucked into were dark and understated in a way that seemed entirely intentional.

It made Angela lament the old sweater and loose pants she was wearing. Why? She hadn't the faintest idea. 

All she knew was that each stair that led her up from the former wine cellar and towards the smell of food was requiring far too much focus. Enough so that Amélie eventually moved so that she was more behind her than beside her. 

Angela took note of that. She stored it away in the recesses of her mind, perhaps to analyze it later when she had the mental capacity to do so. Which was certainly not right now. Because she didn't even remember getting to the dining hall until she was standing in front of the grand fireplace it held basking in its warmth. 

Her lab was always cold. Most of them were. She'd grown used to it over the years, but that didn't mean she didn't appreciate warmth when it was offered to her. 

The clinking of metal behind her caught her attention, and she turned her head in time to see Aloysius placing a plate in front of an empty chair, and the one he'd been holding in the opposite hand in front of Amélie, who had glanced up at her for a moment only to look back down at whatever it was that she'd been focusing her attention on.

Curiosity and hunger outweighed Angela’s need for the warmth of the fire, and she approached the table slowly. Amélie’s seat was at the very end and her own, it seemed, was the last seat on the end of the table to Amélie’s left. 

The dauntingly carved dining chair was quickly pulled back for her by Aloysius, who made another of his little noises before pushing it back in for her once she was seated. Angela was glad. That chair had looked far too heavy for her to properly and politely navigate it right now. She imagined she'd have made all sorts of noise that might have been considered inappropriate in such circumstances.

Then again, this didn't seem all that formal. Amélie was reading something, after all. Wine glass in one hand, and a fingertip of the other trailing along the words her amber eyes were darting over. 

Angela’s own gaze followed, and her brows lifted in surprise at what she saw.

“Do you often read medical journals over dinner?” She asked quietly, and one corner of Amélie’s lips curled just so in response.

“It has become a more regular occurrence since I turned blue, I admit. Forgive me my lack of manners. I'm afraid I'm still unused to the company.” 

But her eyes had never lifted, and she hadn't stopped reading. So Angela reached for her own wine glass as she glanced over what was on her plate. Squab, it seemed. With brussels and some type of mushrooms alongside it. It looked lovely. 

“Did Aloysius cook this?” She asked quietly after taking a sip from her glass.

“ _I_ certainly didn't,” Amélie responded as she flipped the page she'd just finished reading rather delicately. “I can't cook.”

“I'm not the best, either,” Angela admitted with a wry, tired smile. “Aloysius is a man of many talents.” A single bite of brussels sprout told her that much. She usually only tolerated them at best, and these were actually good.

Angela could have sworn she heard a sound just outside the dining hall. One that drew her attention away from Amélie long enough that she missed whatever expression might have come with the short, stilted laugh that mysterious noise had resulted in.

“He appreciates your compliments,” Amélie said quietly as she finally lifted her eyes to focus on Angela. “He always enjoyed ah...to entertain. Parties, I mean. Galas. I think he has been missing such things for quite some time, now.” 

Angela’s smile in response to that was warm and genuine. “I'll be certain to tell him I appreciate his efforts the next time I see him, then. I'm sure he isn't listening, now.”

“Oh, certainly not.” Amélie agreed with a rather comically serious expression. 

“It's a shame my French is so terrible.” Angela lamented in a murmur once her quiet responding chuckle faded as she speared a mushroom with the tines of her fork. 

“Is it?” Amélie asked after another deep sip of wine. 

“I would never subject you to it.” Angela’s brow lifted and she finally began cutting away a sliver of meat. The squab really did look delicious. 

“Strong words.” Amélie mused, flipping another page of the journal and placing her wine glass back down. “Your English is more than adequate, even if mine is...well.”

“Better than mine right now, I'm sure.” Angela responded with a quiet laugh. One that once again pulled Amélie’s attention from what she was reading.

Angela wished, suddenly, that she spoke whatever language it was that those eyes were speaking to her. She wished she had some visual translator to shove in her ear so that she could know what this woman was thinking. What she was hiding behind those eyes.

“My sense of humor begins to slip when I'm tired, as well…” Angela said quietly, digging her teeth lightly into the edge of her upper lip. 

“Your sense of humor leaves nothing to be desired,” Amélie said with a very faint shrug of one of her shoulders. “I find it refreshing.” 

They both sat in silence for a while then. Angela ate most of her dinner. Amélie ate very little of hers. 

“Are you not hungry?” Angela asked when Aloysius appeared to clear away their plates and pour them both another glass of wine. 

“Are you asking as my doctor?” Amélie queried as she finally shut the clear plastic front of the journal she'd been reading and leaned back in her chair, wine glass in hand, and crossed her legs with more grace than any person should be allowed to have. 

“Of course. Your well-being is of utmost concern to me.”

“Funny. You haven't been eating properly or sleeping more than an hour or two at a time for days from what I hear and it is my well being that is being scrutinized.” 

Amélie’s response might have seemed harsh had it not been for the little smile that came along with it.

Either way, it felt strange to Angela to suddenly have Amélie’s undivided attention like this. 

“I've been working hard to get my lab operable,” Angela explained simply once she managed to recover. “I have a couple of days to catch up on everything else before we begin. But that doesn't answer my question.”

“No,” Amélie said, her brows lifting faintly before they settled again and she gestured vaguely with her free hand. “I'm not hungry. You've read my charts. You know that I'm not lacking in anything. I simply don't get hungry the way I once did. If I have breakfast, it's difficult for me to have anything at dinner, and so on.” 

“Fair enough. I appreciate you being candid with me, and I owe you the same courtesy in return.” Angela leaned over the table then. She thought over her next words carefully before she continued, and the intensity of Amélie’s stare didn't waver all the while. 

“I should tell you that I've been having misgivings about what it is that we intend to do here.” She finally said, not missing the flash of panic in Amélie’s otherwise placid eyes. “I'm aware that we have a contract, and it's one that I wouldn't back out of so please don't think that. It's just that I feel any doctor worth anything at all would have their doubts about something that amounts to human experimentation.”

“How kind of you to consider me human,” Amélie responded in a tone that was almost a murmur. The comment caused a furrow to form between Angela’s brows. “I have no such concerns, but I appreciate yours. As misguided as I might think them to be. I want nothing more than for you to be able to finish your research and save the world or whatever it is that you are trying to do, Doctor Ziegler. After I've exhausted this last possibility that there may be some saving of me.” 

Angela swallowed thickly. Those words should have come with so much emotion that simply wasn't there. Not visibly, anyway. And it made Angela’s chest feel heavy in a way she wasn't used to. 

“Why wouldn't I consider you human?” She finally asked, her wine entirely forgotten.

Amélie looked at her with some measure of scrutiny, then. She took in the dark shadows under the doctor’s eyes and barely-there signs of age that anyone else might miss. She wondered idly if Angela smiled enough to have lines where anyone else might. She wondered many things that she gave no voice to. 

“Am I, Doctor?” She finally asked. “Human?”

“Of course you are.” Angela responded gently.

The tone nearly made Amélie wince. She didn't want the softness of it. She didn't want the concern. She almost preferred the cold, clinical presence of every other doctor she'd dealt with.

“Amélie...if there is anything at all that I can do to help you, I have every intention of doing it. You have my word.”

Amélie cleared her throat then and turned her gaze away from Angela rather quickly. 

“Thank you, Doctor.”

“Angela.” 

Amélie exhaled sharply through her nose and gave a single, subtle nod. “You should sleep. Are your rooms not to your liking?”

“I think you know that my rooms are rather luxuriously adequate, Amélie. Don't worry about me. I'll take care of myself. And when the time comes, you will have to be able to let me take care of you as well.” 

Amélie leveled a gaze in Angela’s direction, watching as she stood. It felt almost measuring. Almost intimidating.

And still, Angela didn't back down. She stood there calmly, clearly expecting an answer. 

“Whatever cooperation you require from me you'll have it, of course.” Amélie finally acquiesced after going over those words for a short time before she finally gave voice to them. It was hard, now, to dull the sharpness of her tongue. Harder by far than it had been once upon a time. But she needed Angela’s help. Angela was all she had left in the way of putting the fractured pieces of her life and herself back together.

“Good.” Angela responded, offering Amélie a soft smile full of more warmth than Amélie knew what to do with.

So she did nothing.

She simply turned her attention to her glass of wine as Angela slowly slipped out of the room and let her smile fade as her thoughts grew muddled from the wine and fatigue and mingled with curiosity regarding Amélie. 

Aloysius was just turning her duvet down for her when she made her way through the door of her bedroom, and she offered him a smile that held a least a little of the warmth the one she'd given Amélie had. “Dinner was lovely, Aloysius. Thank you for it.”

She would pretend she didn't know he'd been listening to them.

They both would. It suited them fine. 

“I'm very pleased you enjoyed it.” He responded, confirming her suspicions about the little trills he sometimes let slip. He was pleased. They meant he was happy, but perhaps too dignified in her presence to say as much. “I...overheard you discussing language with Madame over dinner.”

“Oh?" Angela asked as she sat down in the armchair next to her bed and looked up at him. “Your English isn't even accented. It's very impressive. Did you have thoughts on the matter?”

“Only that I can't place your accent.” He responded - sounding almost sheepish. “And I speak many languages.”

“My first language was Swiss-German. Not much reason for you to know that one, I would imagine.” 

“Well, Ms. Angela if I may be so bold - I could learn it with a fair amount of ease. Only for you to have some familiarity about you, of course.” 

“Do you think I need someone to talk to, Aloysius?” She asked, though she clearly found the conversation pleasant. 

“Madame is hardly an avid conversationalist. I didn't think you would mind my offering.” He didn't sound offended. In fact, he always sounded nothing short of matter-of-fact.

“If you were to learn it, it would be pleasant to speak to you in it. I wouldn't be opposed. Do you know what I think?”

“Yes, Ms. Angela?”

“I think I'd like to call you Al, if it wouldn't cause you any offense.” 

Another noise. One of those happy ones, as Angela had so recently come to understand.

“I like that very much indeed, Ms. Angela.” 

“Good.” Angela offered another smile - though they were getting increasingly more tired as the moments passed. “I think I should go to bed for the evening, Al. And I might just sleep in in the morning if you think Amélie wouldn't take offense to my missing breakfast.”

“I don't think that will be an issue...Angela.”

Angela chuckled quietly and pushed herself up from her chair. “Angela is just fine. Even if it's our little secret. Now, you likely have other matters to attend to so I won't keep you any longer. I noticed your Madame’s wine bottle getting low when I left.” 

“Oh, dear.” He responded, and Angela could've sworn there was a bit of mischief in his tone. “We can't have that.”


	4. Take Two

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/49698667006/in/dateposted-public/)

Angela let out a slow, even breath as she glanced over Amélie’s chart one last time. She was tense. That much, Amélie could tell.

“Isn’t there a gown or something I’m supposed to be putting on?” Amélie asked from the examination table she was currently sitting on the edge of. 

Angela gestured towards a nearby cabinet and Al took her direction without her needing to verbalize it. They’d gotten quite good at working together over the past few days, and soon enough - he was making his way over to Amélie with both a gown and a blanket that had been tucked away for her. 

Angela hadn’t expected Amélie to stand up and begin stripping, so when she turned around to say something - her words were lost to her for a moment at the sight of Amélie’s bare back and the rather shockingly large tattoo that spanned its entirety. 

“Do you like what you see, Doctor?” Amélie asked without turning around as she pulled her gown on and lifted herself back onto the table. 

“I was only looking at your tattoo,” Angela explained easily as she finished with the chart and began washing her hands. Al was fussing over Amélie because he knew enough to tell that she was nervous, and she knew enough to let him. 

Soon enough, he seemed pleased enough to have her lower half wrapped in a blanket, not that it mattered. It seemed to matter to him, though, and Amélie was too distracted to argue. 

“You are allowed to look at things, Doctor. You have eyes for a reason. No need to be so…” Amélie trailed off and looked up at Al searchingly. 

“Vanilla, Madame,” Aloysius responded without any hesitation, and Angela almost choked as she stared down into the sink. 

Amélie chuckled, and Angela clenched her jaw and shook her head before she pulled on a pair of gloves with practiced ease. 

“I feel you’re taking this rather lightly, all things considered,” Angela remarked in a low tone as she rolled a tray over towards the table Amélie was laying along. “And you’ve started calling me Doctor again, which leads me to believe that might just be a show that you are putting on for me. Or perhaps for yourself.” 

“Touche,” Amélie’s brow lifted as she responded, and her amber eyes caught Angela’s in much the same way they always did. Even when the rest of her was impassive and mysterious, there had been something about those eyes from the moment she’d walked into Angela’s office at the university. 

It wasn’t really the color of them, though the color was certainly striking. It was something intangible that Angela couldn’t quite put her finger on. Maybe they always seemed to have a question in them. Or maybe it was the dark softness of them. 

Angela looked away first and reached for an elastic band which she slipped around Amélie’s upper arm quickly and tucked just above the crook of it. 

“You know the risks, yes?” 

“I do, Angela,” Amélie’s voice was even more quiet than usual. “You’ve made them quite clear.” 

Angela paused for just a moment longer before she watched carefully for a vein to show itself. She’d known this would likely be a problem, and she pressed a wad of gauze into Amélie’s hand when she realized it was going to be more of a problem than she’d thought. 

“Squeeze this hard every few seconds and then release it,” Angela instructed as she readied the IV needle in one hand while she stroked along Amélie’s inner arm with the fingertips of the other. 

“Okay,” Angela said as she finally found something promising. “I’m using a rather large gauge as a precaution, so you may feel a stick.” 

“Mm. That would certainly be something.” Amélie remarked dryly, watching closely as Angela successfully found a vein and had the IV secured in what seemed almost like one fluid motion. In the next moments, Angela hung a bag of saline on the stand next to the table and then opened the small metal case on her rolling cart to reveal a series of small, yellow-glowing vials.

These were left visible as Angela stuck pads to various places along Amélie’s body. Her eyes didn’t wander, nor did her hands. Amélie was a patient, now. And she was her doctor, nothing more. She would treat her just as she did any other patient. Even if she was strangely fearful that something might happen. 

Not that she wasn’t always concerned for her patients’ well-being. It was just that...well. Being someone’s last hope was a rather heavy burden. And there was something different about Amélie. Something Angela desperately wanted to save. 

Once the monitors were running, and Angela had watched the strange numbers read across the screen, she reached for one of the vials with a hand that was much steadier than she felt inwardly. 

“I fear this is going to be quite uncomfortable for you,” Angela murmured as she carefully drew a dose into the syringe she was holding. A dose she’d decided upon after many sleepless nights of calculations and research. “I’m sorry.” 

“Don't be sorry,” Amélie looked at Angela for a moment before glancing away. “Just do it.” 

At first, Amélie felt nothing. Nothing, aside from a creeping feeling of dread centered around her incessant fear that she was beyond saving. 

She could tell Angela was looking more at her than at the glowing solution she was slowly pressing into the line in her hands. But Amélie couldn't look at her, for once.

Because soon after ‘nothing’, there was warmth. For a fleeting moment, Amélie felt warm.

She didn't even realize a tear had slipped down her cheek as she stared up at the stone ceiling above her.

“Pain?” Angela asked simply as she steadily pushed.

“Zero,” Amélie’s voice was a whisper.

Aloysius made a sound of concern as another tear left a glistening trail down the side of Amélie’s face, but Angela didn't have even a moment to spare for him, right now. 

“What are you feeling?” 

Angela’s tone was firm and assertive enough that it kept compelling Amélie to answer, even though her answers were short and slightly breathless.

“Warm.” 

Angela’s eyes flashed up to the monitors on the other side of the table as she pulled the now-empty syringe and placed it on her cart.

Her breath caught in her throat when she saw a distinct change in the rhythm of Amélie’s heartbeat. It was faster. 

It was _faster_.

Angela was so focused she nearly jumped when she felt Amélie’s fingertips sliding around her gloved hand to grasp it tightly. 

Only then did her eyes fall back to Amélie’s face, and her brow furrowed when she noticed the tears. 

“What are you feeling, now?” Angela asked as she gave Amélie’s hand a reassuring squeeze and cut her eyes quickly to the monitor.

Amélie’s chest was moving more slowly despite the sudden increase in her heart rate. It was almost as though she was trying to hold her breath. She certainly wasn't responding, that was for sure.

“Amélie, I need you to answer me.”

Amélie tried. But she couldn't. She couldn't even move. The warmth had turned to burning. To a pounding ache in her chest as every vein in her body blazed like they were full of molten glass. 

It was excruciating. 

But she _felt_ it. And maybe that's what was keeping her quiet. 

Her grip on Angela’s hand was getting tighter, though. Tight enough that Angela winced as a result. 

“I'm going to have to stop the treatment if you can't speak, Amélie.” 

“Don't,” Amélie gasped, though her back was arching from the table and her fingertips had begun to tremble.

And then, Angela saw it on the monitor. A sudden drastic drop in oxygen levels. In beats per minute. Lower, even, than Amélie’s already unusual baseline readings. 

Amélie’s eyes rolled back, and Angela pried her hand loose from the grip she had on it in order to reach for another syringe - one that was already filled with a solution that would neutralize the technologies in the first that were still running rampant through Amélie’s body. 

“Al, the paddles please,” Angela stated calmly yet firmly as she began pushing the injection. 

He moved more quickly, even, than he usually did. 

Angela thanked whatever god was listening that it seemed they wouldn't be necessary. By the time she finished pushing the neutralizer, Amélie was considerably more stable. Just not quite conscious. Angela spoke to her, anyway. 

“Stay with me, Amélie. I'm just flushing your IV, now. Take deeper breaths for me.”

Angela had never even really seen Amélie breathe aside from when she asked her to and had a stethoscope pressed against her back. So, to see the short, panicked breaths she was currently taking was more than a little alarming.

Eventually, though, they slowed, and Angela let out a deep, shuddering sigh of relief as she reached out to wipe the tear tracks from Amélie’s cheeks without even thinking.

The touch caused Amélie’s eyes to open in a flutter, though they were dazed and unfocused.

“Are you with me?” Angela asked as Aloysius slowly backed away from the table. 

“Oui,” Amélie whispered her reply because that was all she could manage, right then.

“Good. Good.”

“You said that twice,” Amélie observed as her eyes tried to focus on Angela’s face hovering over her own and failed. “No need to be so nervous about nearly killing me when I'm already almost dead.” 

“Tell me what happened. What you felt.” Angela urged as she checked the camera nearby to reassure herself it was still recording.

“Warm,” Amélie whispered as her eyes slipped shut, again. “Burning.” 

Angela swallowed past the lump in her throat and looked away. Away from Al, who had been trying his best to stay quiet despite how upset he likely was. Away from Amélie, who she had nearly lost. She tried to tell herself a lesser doctor might have been even less successful. She really tried.

She let the IV continue running its course as Amélie faded in and out of consciousness on the table. Amélie didn't even stir when she removed it and taped over the little dot it had left in its wake. 

“Take her and the monitor to the grand room please, Aloysius. Where I can keep an eye on her tonight.” Angela said quietly, moving towards the camera to shut it off.

“She would be more comfortable in a bed,” Al responded carefully. Not an argument, of course. Merely a suggestion. Angela reminded herself of Al’s devotion to his charge. She reminded herself that he had been very brave tonight.

“You're right of course. To her rooms, then. And I will join you shortly.” 

All gathered Amélie into his arms, and Angela was pleased to see her shifting in them to make it easier, as though he'd had to carry her before. 

She helped him get a handle on the monitor Amélie was still attached to, as well, and saw him off before moving to be sure all the data from the evening was properly saved and backed up. It was invaluable, she told herself. This was only the first trial, she told herself. And it could have gone worse.

It could have gone much, much worse. And at least now she had something to work with.

It wasn't long before she ascended the stone stairwells on her way up to the only wing on the upper floors that Al seemed to manage to keep up with.

The wing containing both her and Amélie’s rooms. She passed her own without so much as a glance on her way to Amélie.

These rooms were dark.

That was, perhaps, the first thing Angela noticed as she gripped her holoscreen against her chest. 

Dark walls. Dark furniture. Dark curtains.

There fireplace in the sitting area that seemed seldom-used. Above it, an empty space that had left a lighter place where a painting might have once been hung.

On her way towards the distant beeping of Amélie’s monitor in her bedroom, Angela began to notice there were many such empty places on the walls. 

Amélie’s bedroom was no less dark.

From the velvet bedcovers to the sheer material hanging from her canopied bed. Somehow, Angela found it almost soothing. Especially after the bright fluorescents she'd had installed in her lab. Fluorescents she'd spent far too much time working under lately.

The first thing Angela looked for was the painfully slow, yet steady reading of Amélie’s heart. It was normal, now. Normal for Amélie, at least. 

The second thing she noticed was that Al had somehow managed to get her out of her gown and into a thick, soft sweater before tucking her into bed without disturbing any of the pads that Angela had stuck to her. The sweater made Amélie seem terribly small. More so, even, than the too-large bed and the too-large room. 

Angela cleared her throat as she headed for the armchair next to the bed. It didn't seem to go there, so she could only assume Al meant for her to sit in it. 

“Is the fireplace in this room functional?” Angela asked, regretting the thin shirt she was wearing under the white coat she'd forgotten to take off in her haste to return to Amélie's side. 

“They all are,” Al replied simply, and Angela looked up at him. 

“Could you-”

“Of course.”

Angela finally looked more closely at Amélie when Al crossed the room to begin building a fire that would hopefully warm the frigid room. 

She looked fine, mostly. Normal, aside from the fact that Angela wasn't entirely used to her sleeping. Certainly not used to her having trouble staying up. 

Amélie had often come down to the lab while Angela worked into the night, lately. She never seemed the slightest bit tired.

It wasn't until Angela felt the first warmth from the fire that she finally looked away only to realize Aloysius had gone. 

When she looked back, a pair of amber eyes had settled on her, heavy-lidded and dark. 

After all this time, Angela had never noticed the barely-there glow of them. Or perhaps the flames flickering away across the room were playing tricks on her eyes. 

“Are you here to tell me that this is too dangerous? That you can't continue?” Amélie asked, her tone utterly void of emotion.

Angela shifted uncomfortably in her chair and reminded herself that Amélie wasn't a mind-reader. That these were just her fears and insecurities talking. 

“I had considered it,” Angela responded softly. “But no, I'm here to monitor you while I start digging through the data from tonight's trial.”

Amélie’s expression softened, then, so that she looked a little bit less like she was made of stone.

“Will you stay?” She asked, her eyes never leaving Angela, even when Angela pulled up a screen of numbers that illuminated the space between them in a blue haze and obscured Angela’s face. 

Mostly, anyway. Amélie saw the flash of darker blue of Angela’s eyes lifting to meet her own questioning gaze before the fell back to the screen, again.

“I intend to, yes. Unless you would rather I go, I can have Al sit with you.” 

“He isn't here,” Amélie responded simply. 

“Then I will be,” Angela murmured, still trying to focus on what she was reading instead of the raw quality of Amélie’s voice. “Here, I mean,” she added after a pause.

“Yes, I gathered,” Amélie actually smirked, albeit weakly. 

Angela didn't mind. At least she was feeling a little more herself.

“You know I have to ask you if you would like to continue this, I'm sure,” Angela said as she dimmed the brightness of her holoscreen and looked over its projection at Amélie.

“I have no intention of stopping,” Amélie said as though it were painfully obvious. And perhaps it was.

But Angela still needed to hear it from her after what had happened earlier.

“Alright, then. As for your reaction earlier, it would seem the nanotech didn't find anything _wrong_. So, there was nothing to fix. To heal. So it kept searching and spreading until it nearly overwhelmed your system. Through sensation, through your immune system’s response, any number of reasons. I believe I can work with this. I don't think this is even a step back, really.” 

Amélie shifted in bed until she was sitting up, and she ignored the way the room was spinning around her as a result as Angela leaned forward quickly to steady her.

“Do you mean that?” Amélie asked, a sharp furrow forming between her brows over her widened eyes. 

“Of course, I do,” Angela said firmly as she sat her holoscreen to the side and pushed herself out of her chair to stand at the side of Amélie’s bed. “Now lie back down. Please. I can give you something that will help you sleep, if you wish.” 

Amélie swayed a bit as Angela held onto her arm while she shook her head and slid back down into the pillows. 

“I don't need anything,” Amélie whispered, hating the swell of emotion she felt where her chest was still aching from earlier. 

That was a lie, unfortunately. Amélie realized this as she looked towards the fireplace and listened to Angela get settled back in her chair with her work in her lap. 

Amélie needed to not be alone. What had happened earlier had shaken her more deeply than she cared to admit to Angela. Certainly more than she cared to admit to herself. And if she were to be alone, she might have to confront that.

No, it was much better to doze off and on in Angela’s quiet, strangely soothing presence until a deeper sleep finally took her to give her exhausted, strained body time to truly recover. 

Angela sought no such relief. 

She would sleep when Amélie woke. When she was sure that Amélie _would_ wake. And not a moment before. 

Besides, this gave her a chance to begin new calculations and run new trial simulations while Amélie slept soundlessly beyond the screen as a constant reminder of what Angela was working for.


	5. Call Me in the Morning

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/49698667006/in/dateposted-public/)

Angela looked up sluggishly in response to movement in the doorway of Amélie’s bedroom. She was unsure when it had happened, but the grey light of dawn was now filtering in through the windows and the fire that had burned in the hearth was now no more than embers.

“Good morning,” Al’s greeting was subdued and careful, no doubt due to the woman still sleeping soundly in the bed next to where Angela was sitting.

She realized, all at once, that her entire body was stiff. The discomfort of stretching herself out was almost unbearable. 

“Good morning, Al,” Angela’s voice was a croak. Al made a vaguely unhappy sound in response. 

“I have breakfast ready. Would you like to take it downstairs, or with Madame?”

“Downstairs,” Angela whispered as her attention wandered to Amélie. “I'll check her and then I'll be down.”

He nodded once and was gone.

Angela ignored the burning of her tired eyes as she slipped from her chair and moved to Amélie’s bedside. She looked almost peaceful in a way that caused a pang to register in Angela’s chest. She never looked like this when she was awake. Always so far-away. Always so haunted. 

Angela watched for the steadiness of the rise and fall of her chest that signaled her breathing was just fine, and then she headed for the bedroom door. She hadn't expected to find it so difficult to leave, yet she lingered there for a moment. She was suddenly overcome with concern over allowing Amélie to wake alone, but she reminded herself that Amélie didn't need her in that way, and forced herself on and to the stairs that would lead her to the smell of the breakfast Al had mentioned. 

It was fine, Angela was sure. Eggs on toast and good coffee. One of her favorite meals, actually. Her thoughts were just utterly consumed, and she was bone-tired. 

Yet still, the pull to return to Amélie’s side once she'd eaten and Al had cleared the table was too strong to ignore. She could be slow about it though - she decided. She could take the long way through the first floor to come out behind the stone staircase. She could display at least a semblance of self-control.

Especially when she wound up in a study that was in much better shape than most of the chateau. A study with shelves full of books and a small, neat desk with an empty wine glass on it. Al would be irritated he hadn't found it yet when he finally made his rounds.

Angela smiled tiredly at the thought and reached out to touch along the delicate stem of it before her attention shifted to the volumes lining a nearby wall.

She froze when she saw the photograph. She hadn't expected it. Not here. Not anywhere. In all her time with Amélie, she'd never seen a single memento of what her life used to be.

Yet, there it was. One of the most beautiful wedding photos Angela had ever seen. Between the smile on Amélie’s face and the life in her eyes, Angela had a hard time drawing her next breath into her lungs.

Perhaps it was the fatigue setting in that made her forget herself and reach for the photo instinctively. To pull it down closer so she could better see. 

“I loved him, you know.”

Angela nearly dropped the photo in response to the hoarse, quiet voice she heard behind her. The near-slip only made her clutch it tighter as she turned around.

“Amélie, I...I didn't mean to intrude. The last thing I want is-”

“You aren't intruding,” Amélie cut her off shortly but moved no closer. As though the photo had built a wall between them. “Wasn’t I beautiful that day?” 

Amélie’s voice seemed strangely far away as Angela looked at her. She didn’t need to examine the photo again to nod her agreement. 

“You were,” She said quietly, without offering any sort of reassurance as to Amélie’s current state. Amélie didn’t need coddling. She didn’t want it. Besides, the intensity of her amber eyes held Angela in place like a mousetrap and she couldn’t have said more if she’d tried. 

Finally, Amélie moved closer and reached for the photo - slipping it gently from Angela’s hands and looking down at it for a moment. 

“I remembered something last night,” Amélie murmured, lifting the frame away from herself and towards its designated shelf quickly to put it back where it had been. 

“What did you remember?” Angela asked, her nerves suddenly taking a back seat to her desperate need to further understand Amélie’s condition. To help her. 

“I remember Gérard taking me out for a picnic. He often did things like this to make up for the time he had to be gone. Funny, we were both gone just as frequently. I, for my dancing, him for his business. Yet he was the one who convinced himself he had something to make up for.” 

Angela waited quietly because this all seemed so fragile. She tried her best, anyway. Curiosity, though, was a beast that nearly always got the better of her. 

“Was this a specific day?” 

Amélie swallowed thickly and set her jaw as she stared at the nearest row of books in favor of looking at Angela. 

“It was the day I was taken. I’m sure of it,” Amélie blinked something away as though one could blink away emotion, and finally turned her focus back to Angela. “You look terrible.” 

Angela winced and Amélie seemed unbothered. 

“I haven’t slept,” Angela explained with a dismissive wave of her hand. 

“Practice your preachings, then, Doctor,” Amélie’s voice was low, yet soft. Oddly pleasant as it fell on Angela’s ears, despite her chiding. “Or do you plan to make a silly mistake in our next trial due to exhaustion?” 

“My plan was to come check on you after I ate, and then rest once I was sure you wouldn’t have any issues this morning.” 

“I have issues every morning, Angela. I’m fucking blue.” 

“I’m aware,” Angela managed to keep her tone even despite the tone Amélie had suddenly decided to use with her. “Again, I apologize for intruding upon your space like this. I’ll notate the return of your memory and see if I can pinpoint what caused it. Perhaps we can duplicate the results when next we decide to move forward.” 

Amélie swallowed and hated the awkwardness she’d created for herself. For both of them. 

Truth be told, she was angry. Just not for any sort of acceptable reason. 

It wouldn’t really be fair to Angela to tell her she’d been upset to wake up alone. That she’d been scared. That she’d cried over the vivid images of Gérard opening their bottle of wine for them on the hillside overlooking the chateau that morning. Smiling at her. Always smiling at her. 

The gentleness of Angela’s hand touching alongside her own was far too violent. Far too jarring. It felt like a car crash. 

Amélie’s eyes were wild as they snapped up to meet Angela’s despite how unreadable the rest of her features were. 

“Let me go get you something to eat. Maybe some wine. Or I can get you something for nerves? I’m more than well-equipped for whatever it is you may be experiencing. I assure you all these bases have been covered by me, personally.” 

Amélie didn’t realize she’d latched onto Angela’s hand until it was too late. Until she’d already done it. Best not to backtrack now, lest it seem strange. 

“You need to sleep.”

“And I will, once I’m certain you have everything you need and that you’re safely back in bed, because you should be resting.” 

Amélie let out a slight tremor of a sigh in response to Angela’s persistence. It was almost impressive. Most of the people Amélie treated like shit had enough of it immediately. Which was how it should be. Which was...normally how Amélie preferred it. That’s why all the partners had stopped checking in on her. That’s why the various offices she visited to keep her husband’s business alive fell silent the moment she stepped into them. 

“We both need to go to bed, then,” Amélie dared to state the obvious, and Angela glanced down at the way Amélie’s hand clutched at her own. 

“Would you like company?” Angela asked, praying to nothing in particular that she was reading the situation right. “I should have stayed in your room with you until you woke.” 

Angela watched the sharp line of Amélie’s jaw set in a hard line when it clenched, and she waited for the shoe to fall. When it didn’t, she took a step closer and gave Amélie’s hand a faint squeeze. 

“Are you upset?” She asked. “With me, I mean?”

“You weren’t there,” Amélie whispered almost bitterly as she dropped Angela’s hand like it had burned her. “I don’t need you there. This is ridiculous.” 

Amélie turned on her heel and left Angela in the dust of her failed attempts, floundering for what to say. What to do.

In the end, Amélie had gone so fast there was nothing she _could_ do. So she went to find Al. She went to find out what Amélie’s favorite breakfast was. She winced to hear it involved a glass of wine, especially after the prior night, but she allowed him to pour one and place it on the tray she’d already decided to carry up the stairs, herself. 

It didn’t take her long to make her way to Amélie’s room. In fact, Angela felt as though she lingered outside her door for longer than she’d spent in the kitchen with Al. She was unsure why it took her so long to finally nudge the door open, only that it was almost pitch black inside once she had. 

The fire had burned out a long while ago, leaving a chill in the room. The curtains were of far too high a quality to let any light slip past them. It was only the light filtering in from the hallway outside that allowed Angela to see Amélie sitting naked on the edge of her bed. 

“I should have knocked,” Angela said hurriedly the moment she realized. “I’ll let you get dressed.”

“I’m not getting dressed,” Amélie’s response was immediate and firm, and Angela gripped the tray in her hands a little harder as a result. 

“Alright, then. Where do you want your breakfast?” 

Amélie looked over at Angela slowly, and Angela observed that very faint, ever-present glow in Amélie’s eyes as it observed her. Like something from another world stalking her in the darkness. Something that wasn’t at all Amélie. 

Angela reminded herself that she was a scientist. That she didn’t believe in such things. 

“I only want your company,” Amélie responded finally, and the familiar sound of her voice eased Angela’s fears, somewhat. “Do you not want mine?” 

Angela realized she was still staring and looked away quickly. “I don’t know.” 

Amélie could hear the lie in her voice. She could hear it washing over her, still, as she stood and made her way across the room to Angela to remove the breakfast tray from her hands. 

“Shall I get dressed, then?” Amélie asked after leaning in just a little too close. “Have I been wrong about the way you look at me?” 

“You should get dressed because I’m your doctor, and because you need to rest.” 

Amélie could feel, too, the way those words trembled as the warmth of them brushed against her too-close lips. 

Too close, until they were brushing against Angela’s own. The softest kiss Angela had ever experienced. Cool in the way that Amélie always seemed to be cool. 

Angela didn’t return the kiss, and it broke something in her to not. 

Amélie pulled back and looked at the wall behind Angela’s shoulder. 

“I see,” She whispered, handing Angela back the tray. “You are hurt by the sharpness of my tongue, yet you are disinterested in the softness of the rest of me.” 

_So I have no way of keeping you._

“It isn’t that I’m…” Angela sighed heavily and carried the tray towards the bed. She looked around for a moment before she spotted a robe hanging on one of the bed posts blending into its dark surroundings. Amélie looked distant and wounded all at once when she walked back over to her holding out the robe. “It isn’t that and I think you realize this much. It’s that I’m here to help you. And I don’t think fucking me every time you remember something is going to help. I also don’t want to be used like that. I’m sorry for that. Truly.” 

Amélie’s stinging emotions dulled suddenly with the surprise she felt. Perhaps it hadn’t even dawned on her what this might seem like to Angela. But she couldn’t say Angela was wrong, either. About the using. She would much rather experience something new than she would dwell upon all the things she’d lost. Angela deserved better than that, really. But then, Angela deserved better, in general. Better than a molding chateau and a woman who felt everything as though it were through a looking glass. 

She put the robe on silently and Angela watched her walk towards the bed with far more grace than anyone should be allowed to possess. She thought of the time she'd seen that grace on stage. The time she'd seen Odille and Odette move with such unnatural beauty the image had never left Angela’s mind.

She wondered if Amélie ever thought of them, now. She dare not wonder whose ending Amélie might prefer, or who she might now identify with. She also wouldn't ask. Wouldn't admit any of this to her. Not now. Perhaps not ever.

“Would you like me to stay?” Angela asked. “I would very much like for you to eat. If my presence would either help or hinder that, please tell me.”

“Stay,” Amélie said simply, and Angela felt relief flood her for so many reasons she couldn't even make sense of it all, anymore. 

Angela moved to the same chair she'd been in all night as Amélie lay back against the headboard and rested the tray over her lap. It was a rather plain breakfast, but she preferred her breakfasts plain. Especially when she felt as off as she did this morning.

“The bed is more than large enough for two,” Amélie noted aloud. “I won't touch you, Angela. Not again. I don't know who I am, really, but I am certainly not the type of person who might do that.”

“I believe you,” Angela said without hesitation, because she did. She did well at hiding the ache she was feeling. The thought that this might have all been different in another world and another time. Her lips still burned with the memory of Amélie’s own pressing against them, and her heart was still in pieces as a reward for her own strength.

What a terrible reward.

“You would like for me to sleep with you?” Angela asked.

“You've made it so very clear that that isn't on the table,” Amélie drawled as she lifted a slice of toast and took a healthy bite.

“That isn't at all what I meant,” Angela said, her tone and her body language rather guarded as she stood beside the bed. Guarded enough that even Amélie managed to register it.

“I'm only trying to lighten the mood. Yes, I'd like you to sleep here in this bed next to me. I don't need it, though. Don't feel obligated to stay.” 

“I don't feel obligated,” Angela said quietly, and in a way - that was true. It wasn't Amélie that made her feel this way. This unavoidable pull. It was all self-contained, really. Unchanging.

She could never fix herself, she thought, as she got onto the bed next to Amélie, who had placed her tray aside in favor of sipping at her wine. But she could fix other people. Help them. Not fix them.

She always reminded herself she didn't have that power. She tried to remind herself.

“Will you sleep soon?” Angela asked as she got comfortable on top of the covers under the assumption Amélie would be beneath them.

Amélie shrugged, noncommittal.

“Do you need something to help you sleep?” Angela asked as she rolled onto her side and propped her head up to look at Amélie. 

“No,” Amélie said quickly. “No, I don’t have the best relationships with things that make me sleep.” 

Angela frowned more at herself than anything. “I’m sorry, Amélie.” 

For what, she didn’t specify. 

Amélie didn’t need her to.

She looked over at Angela slowly, and Angela feared she might burn under her gaze. She’d never felt quite so transparent as she did right then. Or powerless. 

“I don’t want your apologies,” Amélie finally said when she saw Angela shift uncomfortably, “or your guilt. You didn’t do this to me.” 

“I didn’t, but I care,” Angela sounded so adamant even though her voice wasn’t as steady as it usually was. 

Amélie turned her attention away immediately. 

There was something so pure-looking about Angela. Maybe her eyes. Maybe her earnestness. 

But it felt to Amélie sometimes as though she were the devil incarnate walking into a cathedral when she looked at her. At her piety. Her polish. Her gleaming altar of self-sacrifice and martyrdom. 

“You wanted to kiss me earlier,” Amélie observed as she looked down at the near-empty wine glass she was still holding. Anything to reveal a crack. Anything to feel worthy of this woman’s presence. To not feel like a stain. 

_Please tell me you wanted to kiss me earlier._

Amélie hated the thought as soon as she dismissed it. She hated, even, that she’d said what she’d said. So much so that she was fairly certain her already sluggish heart stopped entirely with Angela’s answer. 

“I did,” her voice was a whisper, “very much. But I just can’t do that, Amélie.”

“Why?” 

“It isn’t fair to either of us,” Angela explained, sounding almost breathless. 

Amélie could feel Angela’s eyes on her, so she turned onto her side facing the opposite wall. She thought if Angela looked hard enough she might see the way her throat was aching, right now. 

“I’ll sleep, now,” Amélie breathed as she pulled her pillow close to herself and left her wine on the bedside table. 

Angela looked at her worriedly. At her long, bare legs exposed to the cold room from the hem of her robe. She knew Amélie was used to being cold, yet there was something so painful about watching it not bother her. Watching her not seek warmth. One of the basest, most human needs. 

“I’ll get you a blanket,” Angela offered, pushing herself up from the bed to gather the one that was folded at the foot of it. Wordlessly, she draped it over Amélie and lay back down too far away for her presence to be felt. 

“Thank you,” Amélie whispered, and Angela’s lips parted in surprise. She thought of a hundred things she might say, or ask. A hundred things that both were born and died on the tip of her tongue all at once. 

“You’re welcome.”


	6. Bonne Nuit

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/49698667006/in/dateposted-public/)

The days had begun to seem so long to Angela, suddenly. Amélie had been so distant. For two weeks, now, things had been like this.

Two awful, isolating weeks of Amélie avoiding her at breakfast and at dinner. Only lingering near the lab to check on her progress or offer to have Al bring her something.

It was killing her. Every look and every unspoken word made it harder for Angela to breathe. She was suffocating. Crushed by walls that were far too spacious to feel as claustrophobic as they'd begun to feel. 

What was worse, was that all this had begun affecting her work. Slowing her progress. She'd begun to catch herself making mistakes in her calculations that she would've even have made in secondary school. 

She hadn't even noticed her eyes were burning as she typed away at her laptop until the wet heat of a tear seared its way down one of her cheeks, and she took her glasses off quickly to wipe her face and shut the screen.

Her eyes flashed back up just in time to catch the faintest hint of movement in the hallway beyond. 

“Amélie?”

Was she beginning to see things? Was her mind putting Amélie where she wasn't? Did she want her so badly? 

_No. No._

No, she didn't want Amélie. She wanted to _save_ her.

That's why she'd been dreaming of evil barons and handsome princes and of dying swans. 

“Dr. Ziegler?” Al’s voice was jarring from behind her in its near utter lack of emotion. Jarring because he somehow still sounded worried. “Is everything alright?”

“Was Amélie outside the lab just now?” She asked quickly without worrying over how frantic she must have sounded.

“The Madame is in her studio this evening,” Al responded simply. “She asked to be left alone.” 

“Her studio?” Angela asked, slowly turning in her chair to look at the large omnic man who was now blinking at her. 

“Perhaps I should not have said that,” he responded, though he didn't sound particularly regretful. “But it seems I've said it, anyway.” 

“What kind of studio does she have, Al?” Angela asked as she tapped a pen against the surface of her desk so rapidly she was irritating herself and had to stop.

“The kind that is down the furthest corridor past the banquet hall on the main floor of the château located behind the fourth door on the right,” Al looked at Angela for a moment before turning his attention back down to the clipboard he'd been holding.

“Why are you telling me this?” Angela asked after a pause.

“Because I care about you a great deal, but I care about Amélie even more than that. More, perhaps, than I was ever intended to be able to care. And she is hurting in a way that I can do nothing about. But I believe you can, and that you want to terribly. I can only hope you'll act on that desire before I lose you, my only friend, to insanity, and before I lose Amélie, altogether.” 

“I don't know where all of this is coming from, Al,” Angela said, because she didn't know what else to say. “I'm not entirely certain why you think you know what I want.”

“Because I've seen someone love her before,” Al said without hesitating.

He looked as brazen as he sounded, somehow. Angela wasn't certain her heart was still beating. 

“You...you don't have any right to...you can't compare…”

“It is maddening, I think, to love her,” Al cut her off quietly. She let it happen. “There is something about her that seems so much to me like kindling. Like too much kindling sitting in a hearth only growing dryer day by day. More volatile. More and more ready to catch and to burn each day. And to see someone look at her - look into the flame she could so easily become - and be drawn to it...well. I am only saying I have seen this before. The way you look at her. Like you want desperately to be burned.”

“You're wrong, Aloysius. I just want to help her,” Angela didn't realize her response was going to be a whisper until it was too late. Until it sounded much more like she was trying to convince herself of something than it sounded like any ordinary answer. 

“Quite right,” Al said, following those words with a series of sounds Angela didn't recognize, at least in the state she was currently in. “Well, she is in her studio. You might check in before you go to bed. She has been unwell in a way I have no remedy for.”

Angela didn't trust herself to speak anymore. It seemed best to leave the lab, despite everything in her screaming at her to stay. To keep working. She was so close. One more hour. Maybe a couple.

She was fumbling with her glasses by the time she got to the stairs that led to the main floor. Wiping furiously at her face and her eyes as her tears betrayed her time and again. She could hear her own pulse in her ears, even, as she careened down the furthest corridor past the banquet hall and came to a stop outside the fourth door on the right. 

Her hand was on the stone wall next to her. Trembling as she forced air into her lungs so deep and so hard that it hurt. It took a while for what she was hearing to really register.

Op. 20. On a record player, from the sound of it. The waltz, Angela was fairly sure.

She thought to knock. She truly did. 

Even as she pressed at the impressive set of doors she'd never touched before and they creaked open just a touch. 

Through the crack, she was met with Amélie's gaze in mirrors that were likely priceless. Parquet floors that were polished and cared for. Worn, just a touch, by the barre that lined them. 

It was all far too surreal for Angela. The orchestra. The too-bright lights that washed out Amélie’s skin. 

Why, then, was she stepping through the doors to be blinded as Amélie slowly turned to face her? Why was she standing there in her lab coat with the bags under her eyes and her fucked up hair on full display. She looked unhinged in the mirrors, even to herself. There were so many mirrors. 

“Why are you here?”

Angela’s eyes snapped up to meet Amélie’s, and she found them shockingly cold. 

“I'm sorry,” Angela breathed as she reached up to her own chest where she'd hung her glasses from her shirt. “I'm sorry, I shouldn't be.” 

Amélie moved even more gracefully than usual, and Angela wondered if it was because of the music. If it, too, was playing tricks on her. 

Amélie took the glasses into her hands before Angela could put them on.

“Are you familiar?” She asked Angela as the music shifted, her face a mask of nothing and everything all at once.

“Swan Lake,” Angela murmured almost warily. Guardedly.

“Danse des petits cygnes,” Amélie specified as she looked down at Angela’s glasses and then lifted them to her face. She put them on for her slowly and carefully and then dropped her hands away entirely. 

“Dance of the little swans,” Angela murmured her recognition. 

“Do you like ballet, Dr. Ziegler?” Amélie asked as she stood there. Too close. Not close enough. Angela wasn't sure.

“A great deal,” Angela wouldn't look at her. She couldn't. 

“I hate it,” Amélie breathed, and Angela was shocked at how pained those words suddenly sounded. 

“But-”

“Did you come here to see me make a fool of myself again?” Amélie demanded suddenly, though she hadn't taken a single step back. “Do you wish to know the depths of my willingness to debase myself? How high, exactly, is the horse that you rode to Annecy on, Doctor?”

“I don't deserve this,” Angela said, and when she looked up - Amélie was rather shocked to find her eyes glassy and red. “I don't. I'm trying so hard, Amélie, to do what's best for you. You have no idea.”

“Don't I?” Amélie asked, trying to gentle her tone. For what reason, she wasn't sure. The words that came out were not gentle. “Don't I know that you make sure I know how you suffer? All the lost and lonely looks? The refusal to eat or sleep properly? When I could have you asleep in my bed every night by eleven and we could have coffee waiting when you woke? Don't I know, Angela, how selfless you are?” 

“No,” Angela almost spat the word. There was venom dripping from it. Amélie faltered. “No, you really don't. I dream of you, do you know? And it's gotten worse since you've started this game of yours where you dance around me the way you do. And so, I don't sleep. And what is your solution? That we fuck? That I come to your bed every night and fuck you and all of this will just be fine? That my mind will return to rationality and sense and I'll be able to function properly again? One near-kiss and I'm driven almost mad and you think I'm denying myself out of martyrdom and not practicality.”

“Shut up,” Amélie breathed, her eyes blazing with indignation and pain that Angela had only just now recognized. “Stop. Don't tell me I don't understand.”

Amélie’s voice broke in a strange way, and Angela reached for her only to find her arm held tightly. Her hand safely at bay. 

“I don't like to be made to feel as though I don't understand,” Amélie took a shuddering breath and released it, then, and released Angela’s arm at the same time.

Angela felt guilt stinging at the outer edges of her consciousness, then.

“What is it then?” Amélie asked, “Be truthful with me.”

“You are not in the proper state to make this sort of decision. And...neither am I. The last thing you need right now is for the one person in your life with any sort of authority to abuse it.”

“Is this Château Ziegler, then?” Amélie asked, trying her best to even and lower her tone. “It is your name on the map they sell in the village to the tourists? On the historical plaque there near the town square? On the postcards?”

Angela’s brow furrowed, and Amélie continued.

“When did you fall under the assumption you had any sort of power over me, Angela? When I am the one employing you, and the one visiting you in your dreams?”

“Do you control those too, then?” Angela asked, no longer aware of where these words were coming from. “My very dreams? Burning images into my mind of things that I can never have? Leaving me so exhausted I can no longer perform simple calculations?”

“You can have them,” Amélie breathed, and she hated the words the moment they fell from her lips. 

“You’re only offering because you don’t-” Angela stopped herself when Amélie’s still-fresh words flashed again through her thoughts. 

Amélie’s face fell, anyway. The music became loud even to her, suddenly. 

She stepped away. Out of the tension thrumming between them like catgut on a violin bow. Fraying, strand by strand. 

“You can go, you know,” Amélie said as she retreated towards the record player across the room to turn the volume down. “To bed, to dinner. Wherever you like. You don’t need to be here with me.” 

“I know I don’t,” Angela said, unsure whether or not it was a lie. 

“Then I'll ask once more why you’re here,” Amélie said as she turned to look at Angela, her hand still poised on the volume knob. 

“Because I can’t help it.” 

Her response was quick. The words had tumbled over each other in their desperation to finally escape Angela’s mind. 

“Can’t help what, exactly?” Amélie asked, and the intensity of her gaze threatened to become too much for Angela once again. 

“Needing to be near you.” 

Angela was breathless in a way that had Amélie’s head tilting faintly. 

When she seemed unwilling or unable to continue, Amélie filled the silence for her. 

“We are both so terribly lonely,” she clenched her jaw against the bitterness of the price she’d paid to admit that, but continued, nonetheless. “And for what reason?” 

Angela shook her head and stayed mostly still as Amélie approached again, though she seemed almost cautious this time. 

“Are you not lonely?” Amélie asked as she came to a stop a step or two away from Angela. 

“Every day,” Angela whispered. “For so, so long.” 

“Then it is only what you’re used to,” Amélie observed as gently as she could manage. “And change must scare you.” 

“I’m so tired,” Angela said as she reached out suddenly for Amélie - grazing the sides of her hands with the tips of her fingers until Amélie carefully wrapped her arms around the small of her back over her lab coat. “I’ve never been so tired.” 

“Let me take you to bed, then,” Amélie offered, ignoring the strange ache in her chest that came with the warmth of Angela’s body so near to her own. “With the promise that I won’t make any more advances. My pride simply can’t afford it.” 

Angela leaned into her gradually. As though the wall she’d built between them was made of wet sand that need only be nudged to begin toppling. 

Amélie had to stop herself from breathing too sharply when the delicate bridge of Angela’s nose brushed her own just before their lips nearly touched, but only nearly. 

“I'm sorry,” Angela murmured as Amélie clutched at her coat against her back. “About your pride. I mean that.” 

“It's my own fault,” Amélie responded, though if she'd been meaning to say more, her voice left her entirely when Angela’s hands slid along her sides over her shirt. 

“You are tired,” Amélie reminded both of them, voice barely audible. “You are so warm…”

It was the desperation of that remark that made Angela ache more than anything. She wanted nothing more than for Amélie to be warm. All she could think to do was wrap her in her arms and pull her into them tightly. Her lab coat rustled as Amélie held onto her a little harder and slowly pressed her face against her shoulder. 

“Does it bother you?” Angela asked in a murmur near Amélie’s ear.

“It feels dangerous,” Amélie said on instinct, because it did. It crept along her skin through her clothing. It slithered and burned and reminded her of so much. 

“I'm not dangerous,” Angela breathed as Amélie’s hand found the back of her neck. “That much I can promise.”

“I am,” Amélie warned without hesitation. “I think I am.”

“I'm not afraid, Amélie. I'm not afraid of you.”

Angela wasn’t entirely certain why she felt so compelled to prove this. Why, at her age, she felt compelled to prove anything to anyone. This was just how she was. So she wasn’t particularly surprised at herself when she turned her head and brushed her lips against the corner of Amélie’s mouth. 

“Are you trying to kiss me?” Amélie asked, her words a cool sensation against Angela’s lips. 

“I was,” Angela responded. “I am.”

“Try again.” 

Angela released a breath just before she did. It was much different, this time. Angela was so unused to this. She didn’t stop to think, as Amélie dug her fingernails into the nape of her neck, that they both were. It was all she could do to keep her head on straight when Amélie pressed in a little harder and delivered the gentlest imaginable bite to her lower lip before she stopped and pressed their foreheads together. 

Amélie relaxed her grip on the back of Angela’s neck and spread her fingers across the little crescents she’d left there almost apologetically as Angela’s hands moved to her hips to grip them. Not drawing them closer together, yet not pushing them further apart, either. 

There was so little surety in Angela’s hands, and that wasn’t even taking into account the fact that they were trembling. 

“When was the last time you ate?” Amélie asked as she stroked behind Angela’s ear with the side of her thumb. 

“That isn’t why I’m shaking.” 

“I know,” Amélie’s voice was so gentle it was almost startling. 

“Last night,” Angela responded a little reluctantly. “I thought I was the doctor here.”

“Someone has to care for you,” Amélie said as though it should have been obvious. “And you are caring for me. It would only be fair I return the courtesy.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Angela could give her that much. She could relinquish that much, even as muddled as her thoughts were, now. 

“Go bathe, then, and I’ll have Aloysius bring you something. You look dead on your feet. Please don’t set an alarm in the morning.” 

Even as Amélie spoke, their hands lingered where they had been. Amélie’s split between the small of Angela’s back and her hair, and Angela’s on Amélie’s hips. 

“I thought you wanted this,” Angela wasn’t sure how her attempt at a joke might go over. Amélie’s breathy almost-laugh was good enough for her, though. 

“For you to fall asleep beneath me before I’ve even touched you? No. No, that isn’t what I want.”

Angela nodded. She was both relieved and disappointed and appalled with herself for her utter lack of willpower. But what was done was done, and they’d certainly done something tonight. Something it wasn’t so easy to come back from. 

Amélie walked her to the stairs, and they paused there reluctantly. There would be no more kisses that night, though. Just another touch or two and a look that lingered a little too long before Angela finally broke their self-imposed silence. 

“I’ll have everything ready for your next trial soon. Within the week.” 

“You won’t have anything ready at all if you don’t take care of yourself,” Amélie reminded, her voice only faintly chiding. 

“Noted,” Angela sighed and bit her lower lip where Amélie’s teeth had been only a few moments ago. Perhaps to recall the feeling. Perhaps simply out of nerves. “Goodnight, then.” 

“Bonne nuit,” Amélie murmured, and her brows furrowed in response to the words falling so effortlessly and sweetly from her own lips. 

She turned and left Angela at the stairs, and Angela watched her leave because the words had fallen just as sweetly on her ears. 

She cursed herself with each step she took towards her bedroom. She cursed herself for her obsessiveness with her work. That it had driven her to this point. 

She cursed herself because that wasn’t it, at all, and she knew it.


End file.
